Welcome Lonny Magazine!

I have missed Domino Magazine (so, so much like a lot of us – how did this happen??!!) and now there is Lonny, a new online magazine that is trying really hard to fill that void.  With former Domino staffers brought in as contributors, along with many talented designers, decorators, bloggers, photographers and design industry professionals, I think that they will succeed.  I really hate that my favorite type of magazine – shelter and home decorating mags – are the first to go in these trying times, so maybe something like Lonny will bring this particular magazine industry back to life!

Lonny officially launched yesterday, and being that I’m home sick – guess what I was doing!  Looking over Lonny – and that made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.  And inspired.  And happy.  My little laptop struggled a little bit, but one restart later (and closing down my 10 other tabs that were open) and it worked just fine.  Lonny is beautiful, and a great read.  But there are some pros and cons – and so here is my first assessment of Lonny!

One thing I do miss, which is a given, is actually flipping through those glossy pages and holding the magazine in my hands, bookmarking my favorite pages to reference (with those Domino stickers!!), but there are a lot of pluses to looking at Lonny online:  1) You can print or share the pages that you like very easily.  2) You can click on products that you like and it will take you straight to that webpage to shop! Or if you’re like me, window shop.  3)  You can search for keywords and all of the results are right in front of you.  4)  You can view the entire magazine on one page, and then click to zoom in on the specific page you want.  It takes a bit of getting used to, but I really think that an online magazine is the wave of the future and a lot of others will follow suit very soon.

It seems to have everything that I, along with others like me are interested in and missed about Domino; house tours, decorating tips, easy-to-copy/reinterpret styles, gardening how-to’s, budget style, eco-friendly products, and fashion/interior correlations and predictions.  I also like how Lonny showcases a huge variety of price points – from $7.99 IKEA side tables, to thrifted antiques, to a $1,200 dining chair (or how to turn a thrifted antique into one that looks like its $1,200) and how to mix them all together stylishly.  There are 4-5 tips in almost every article, for example, 5 tips when renovating, 4 Easy Pieces, 5 easy ways to live more sustainably, 5 tips on entertaining with style, 5 tips on DIY – I like it broken down like that – having “rules” to pull from.  And the “tips” sections are easy to spot in the index – they’re in pretty little scrolled boxes so you can skip around and find them quickly!

Lonny is also all about the bloggers.  They feature them in their articles, they have bloggers as contributors (Grace Bonney of Design*Sponge, along with Eddie Ross of Design Star), and they thank the bloggers for talking about Lonny and allowing it to “see the light of day.”  I think that’s pretty cool.  The end section is even called “Blogger Style.”  So calling all bloggers – here’s your big chance!  I’m interested to see what else they do with regard to bloggers in future issues.

And the final thing I love about Lonny: it’s free.  Well, it isn’t “final” but I can only talk about so much here!!  You go to their website to read it and that’s it!  I’m assuming that the clickable ads that are placed throughout the magazine are all that’s keeping it running, but I’m not going to question that for now.  I can’t wait until the next issue…does anyone know how often they’re going to be publishing?  I would LOVE it if it’s a monthly mag, but I don’t see that happening.  Let me know if you know more!

Have you clicked over and checked it out yet?  What do you think??

(images via Lonny Magazine)